


The Boy Who Fell From The Sky

by violetstorm



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe, Castle in the Sky AU, Crushes, Fluff, Humor, M/M, Meet-Cute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-21
Updated: 2020-01-21
Packaged: 2021-02-27 12:54:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22343623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/violetstorm/pseuds/violetstorm
Summary: Prompto returns home after a night in the mines and sees a shooting star.(Companion piece/prequel toMorning in Lestallum)
Relationships: Prompto Argentum/Noctis Lucis Caelum
Comments: 8
Kudos: 40





	The Boy Who Fell From The Sky

**Author's Note:**

> I drafted this and wrote most of it back in autumn 2019 and decided to finish it up to start clearing out my WIP list for 2020! :3c Hope you enjoy!
> 
> (Title taken from Castle in the Sky's OST: [The Girl Who Fell From The Sky](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yy8MEO_2AYo))

Prompto Argentum is a pretty normal guy. There’s not much that stands out about him. Sure, there’s his bright hair that doesn’t stay down and his freckles, but that’s about it. He wakes up at dawn, takes care of his birds, works in the mines, and goes home to sleep. His life is predictable and completely normal, with nothing that’s out of the blue.

So when Prompto is coming home after the mines one night, walking alone on a path leading up to his house, he spots a shooting star and doesn’t think much of it. Sure, it’s pretty, but he doesn’t bother making a wish on it, ‘cause nothing  _ amazing  _ is gonna happen to him or anything.

But the shooting star looks strange—it’s blue, its colour unlike any other shooting star Prompto’s seen, and it’s moving downwards. Slowly, too, like it’s falling out of the sky. Prompto takes a step off the path, then two, and suddenly he’s jogging towards the shooting star. It’s heading straight towards the mines and things as strange as that don’t come around every other day.

Prompto squints, but he can’t make out the shape of the shooting star until he reaches the edge of the mines, standing before the Great Pit of Death, as he’s nicknamed it before. He follows the path of the shooting star as it comes lower and lower and—wait a sec. Wait a damn second.

He rubs at his eyes. But nothing changes when he opens them. 

That—what the—that can’t be a…  _ person?  _ Prompto’s standing on the tips of his toes and just barely, he can make the shape out of a person, surrounded by a blue glow. They’re practically blending in with the sky, but the glow is so bright that Prompto has no fear about losing the person.

How— _ how the hell is a person floating?  _ Prompto wants to think he’s dreaming but the cold wind’s biting into his skin and telling him no, this is real. Open-mouthed, he watches the person floating down, down, down and  _ holy shit  _ he’s heading straight for the Pit of Death.

Prompto jumps into action and climbs up a machine that hands over the Pit of Death, crawling up the metal bars with a speed that would make Cor proud. He runs to the end, taking care not to fall down himself, and waits at the edge for the person as they come closer.

Prompto braces himself and holds out his arms. He can see them a lot more clearly now—he’s a boy, dressed all in black and his hair is as dark as the night sky, gently waving in the wind. The blue glow around him is soft. He gently falls into Prompto’s arms.

His eyes remain shut and really, Prompto’s trying not to be a weirdo about this, but he can’t help but stare. There’s no other word for it but  _ beautiful.  _ The boy is beautiful and no, wait, that’s not right. That can’t be right. He’s gotta be an angel.

Nobody else can have skin that clear and lips that look that soft and hair that pretty. He’s too ethereal to be a human and he’s glowing  _ and  _ he fell from the sky. Yep, seems pretty angel-like to Prompto.

The blue glow pulses one last time, then begins to dissipate, almost being sucked into a ring the boy-angel-thing wears on his right hand, and the guy all but  _ drops  _ into Prompto’s arms. Prompto’s knees almost buckle and he cries out, nearly dropping the boy a hundred feet down into the mines. By the will of the gods, or maybe just Gladio’s training regimen, Prompto manages to haul the boy upwards, bringing him away from the Pit of Death.

Through this all, the boy doesn’t wake up. He almost looks like he’s… sleeping? The night’s breeze ruffles the boy’s hair and Prompto feels the urge to reach out and run his hands through that. But he’d probably get smited by another angel or astral or whatever, so he keeps his hands to himself.

Mostly. Eventually, it becomes evident that nobody’s going to come back to the mines and Prompto doesn’t want to risk leaving the boy here to go to Lestallum by himself for help. He can’t carry the boy to Lestallum, too, so his best bet is going to his house on the hill. For what’s definitely not the first time and what certainly won’t be the last, Prompto curses himself for living so far from the main town.

He takes a deep breath, then drapes the boy in his jacket and picks him up. His arms are burning with the pain of carrying him after an already grueling day, but he grits his teeth and starts putting one foot in front of the other, carrying the probably-an-angel back to his house.

For the most part, the trip’s uneventful. Prompto almost drops him once or twice, but they make it to his house in one piece. It takes some jostling to unlock his front door and Prompto kicks it shut when he’s inside, all-too-eager to keep the cold out.

He deposits the boy on the bed, moving his jacket and replacing it with a blanket. He’s still sleeping, as deep as ever, but he doesn’t seem to be hurt. It’s completely quiet inside the house, save for the boy’s soft breaths, and that’s when Prompto flips out.

“Okay, dude,” he whispers to himself, trying and failing to keep his voice from rising. “You’ve got an angel. Like, a literal angel inside your house right now. To be more specific, he’s on your bed. Okay, that’s okay. Things are gonna be okay. Everything is making  _ total  _ sense!”

For once, Prompto’s thankful the boy is still asleep.

“Iggy, what would Iggy do? Oh, I wish I could ask him for help. Should I try feeding him? But what if angels don’t eat human food? Do you eat human food?”

The angel remains asleep and does not answer. But his stomach definitely does and its pain tells him,  _ hello I eat human food please feed me now. _

He doesn’t know if he can stomach anything, but he throws together a pathetic dinner anyways, just to get something in his stomach—a sandwich that tastes like gravel in his mouth. All the while, Prompto keeps an eye on the boy. He’s never really seen anyone that beautiful before.  _ And  _ he’s in Prompto’s bed. Even without considering the actual angel part, this all sounds like the set-up to a great story he’d tell around the mines and prove that he’s  _ not  _ a shut-in.

But angels probably aren’t interested in humans, so Prompto pushes that thought to the back of his mind and pulls out a spare blanket, laying it on the ground. It makes for a poor bed, but it’ll have to do. He sets his alarm for the crack of dawn, as usual, and rolls over.

He falls asleep faster than usual, lulled by the boy’s steady breaths.

* * *

Dawn breaks, and the boy stays asleep. He doesn’t wake, not even to the sound of Prompto making breakfast or feeding his birds or cleaning up. The day’s bright and beautiful and normally, Prompto wouldn’t mind the walk to Lestallum, but he doesn’t want to leave the boy alone. The others at the mine are gonna have to do without him. Nobody else may have the knack for technology that he does, but they can keep the machines running for one day.

Prompto stays indoors, sitting at his kitchen table, tinkering with a broken clock Nyx asked him to fix a while back. Normally fixing stuff like this is supposed to be simple, but somehow, Nyx goddamn Ulric had managed to fuck it up so badly that even Prompto was having trouble finding out where to start.

It’s still meditative work though, so Prompto doesn’t mind, and he knows that Nyx is gonna pay him the same amount of money no matter how long he takes—even if Prompto told him, explicitly, that he doesn’t need it. And it’s kinda a little domestic, too. It’s been too long since he’s had company in his own house.

Just as Prompto’s finishing his work on the clock, he feels the hairs on the back of his neck raising. The air’s grown still and he sets the clock and his tools down on the table. He turns his head towards the bed.

The boy is awake. He’s sitting upright, blanket pushed to his knees, and he’s staring at Prompto intently. It feels like he’s staring straight through Prompto’s soul with his icy-blue eyes and  _ fuck  _ his eyes are just as pretty as the rest of him and  _ fuck  _ everything, that’s not fair at all.

They stare at each other for a moment, then the boy opens his mouth and says, “Who the fuck are you?” and Prompto’s brain short-circuits. The boy’s voice is deep. Like, really deep. Not Gladio-deep, but it’s deep and mature and sexy and Prompto’s totally  _ fucked.  _ But he also swore and Prompto’s no angel, but he’s ninety percent sure that angels don’t cuss and lack manners.

“And where the hell am I?” the boy continues. “What happened to the airship? Are you—are you with Ardyn? What is this place? What the fuck’s going on?”

The guy starts dragging himself out of bed, his movements sluggish. And Prompto really wants to say something important, tell the boy to lie down or something ‘cause he’s obviously exhausted, or maybe say that he’s only here to help him or answer any of the thousand questions the boy’s asking him. But Prompto’s is pretty sure he’s only got a single brain cell, so he instead blurts out, “Are you an angel?”

That shuts the guy up. He freezes in place, eyes almost comically wide. “Am I a… what?”

“An angel. Are you like, an angel? From the heavens or something?”

“How the fuck—” the guy takes a breath. “What the—what makes you think I’m a fuckin’ angel?”

“I dunno!” Prompto flails his arms. “You’re obviously magical in some way ‘cause you had that blue glow and you came from the sky and didn’t die after falling like, a million feet and you’re too pretty to be a human so _what_ _else am I gonna think?”_

There’s silence, in which Prompto is expecting the angel to probably kill him or something. But the not-an-angel(?) goes, “I guess that makes sense. But uh, no, I’m not an angel. I’m pretty sure I’m just as human as you are.”

“Oh,” Prompto says. 

“Yeah. Not an angel.”

“Then, the…” Prompto waves his hands. “Y’know, the blue glowy thing. What was that about?”

The boy cringes, and toys with the ring around his finger. “You really don’t know what’s this all about?”

“Should I? I dunno, man, I’m just a technophile that works in the mines. I don’t deal with a whole lot of… magical things.”

_ Yeah, you’re gonna really impress him with that one,  _ Gladio’s voice says inside his head. That’s easy for a guy like Gladio to say, who has a natural charm with people and if he weren’t already married to Iggy, he’d probably have a new date every night ‘cause that’s just the type of person Gladio is. But Prompto’s just… Prompto. Even if this guy isn’t actually an angel, he sure as well won’t be impressed by a shut-in whose only talent is tinkering with a machine or two in the mines.

“Whatever. That’s good enough for me,” the boy says. He stretches (holy shit Prompto would not have guessed that the guy was fucking  _ jacked  _ under there) and launches himself off the bed. “So, you got any food over here? I’m hungry as shit.”

Prompto stands up a little too fast, jostling the table. “Y-Yeah, I’ve got some, uh, well, I don’t have a lot, but… I can make some sandwiches?” He goes to the kitchen and immediately starts busying himself without waiting for the boy’s response.

“That sounds good enough for me,” the boy says. He takes the chair Prompto was once on and makes himself right at home, resting his chin on his palms. If Prompto drops something once or twice because of nerves, the boy doesn’t comment on it. 

His back is to the boy and when he turns around, he sees the boy poking around at his stuff. The boy catches his eye and shrugs. “So what’s your deal?” he says. “You live up here by yourself?”

“Mostly. I’ve got a buncha birds that I take care of. And I have a rooster named Chocobo. He’s a cutie!”

“Isn’t it lonely?”

“Not really? I’m used to being on my own and besides, I always work in the mines with the others. And I know a lot of people in Lestallum—that’s the name of the town that’s just below the hill we’re on right now.”

“Oh,” the boy says, taking pause. “That’s nice, I guess. But you don’t have any family?”

Prompto points to a photograph on the wall. “No. When I was younger, my dad passed away. His name was Verstael and he was a really good scientist. After he passed, though, I didn’t have any other family, but the people in the mines kinda took me in. Cor—he’s the guy with the hat—is kinda everybody’s dad, but don’t tell him that. And Gladio and Iggy, the two guys all over each other, are my closest friends. Then there’s the other miners like Nyx and Crowe. We’re all a big family in there,” Prompto finishes. The boy’s staring at him again and he feels his cheeks turning red. Oh no, was that too much? Did he overshare? Is the boy pitying him or is it embarrassing that his only family is just a buncha miners? “Er, what about you?” he asks in an attempt to steer the conversation away from himself.

“Me?” The boy looks away. “No. Not really. My dad died when I was younger, too. All I have is this ring. It used to belong to him. Then I mostly just dealt with the people who worked under my dad. He was kinda an important figure so he had a lot of them and they took me in, but they’re nothing like your family. They don’t really care about me and I don’t care about them.”

That’s… the most the boy’s ever said before and Prompto’s almost upset that it took what he thought was a light-hearted question to get that much out of him. “I’m sorry,” Prompto says, but the boy doesn’t react at all.

“It’s fine. It happened a long time ago, I’ve gotten over my dad. I don’t really care about that anymore,” he says and that wasn’t what Prompto was mostly apologizing for. He should have had a family like Prompto. “Is the food ready?”

The mood whip-lash Prompto gets nearly snaps his neck, but he manages to gather his remaining brain cells to cough out a cohesive, “Uh, Sure! Yeah, buddy, here ya go.”

He sets his sad pile of sandwiches on the table. Ignis would have a field day with this one. The boy takes one chair and immediately digs in and Prompto sits down at the other, trying to remember what Ignis said about having good table manners. Okay, but he’s already sure that the boy is unimpressed with him so there’s no harm in cramming these into his mouth, right?

“So,” the boy says through a mouthful of sandwich. “You’re a mechanic?”

“Yeah, kinda. I work on the machines in the mines, mostly, but I’m also good with anything that’s got screws and wires, basically.”

“Cool.”

Prompto hums. It’s… really awkward eating breakfast with the guy considering he still doesn’t know anything about the boy and oh god, is this how people feel about one-night stands? Spending the night with someone and then waking up to a stranger? Or maybe Prompto’s mind is always trying to default to horny and bringing up the idea of one-night stands where they’re not supposed to belong.

He should  _ not  _ be thinking about one-night stands and this guy. But his bed-head is  _ really  _ hot, somehow, and Prompto still hasn’t gotten over that tiny peek of skin he got when the guy stretched and his shirt rode up just that  _ liiiittle  _ bit.

Prompto gulps down the rest of his sandwich. “Um, I’ve gotta—I’ve gotta go feed my birds,” he says and he all but  _ bolts  _ outside, his pants feeling too tight for his liking. Thankfully, it wasn’t  _ that  _ much of a lie, and Prompto takes his time scattering feed for the birds right outside his house.

Then he feels eyes on his back again and he turns around to see the boy staring at him. Again. 

“Dude, give a guy a warning, won’t you? You’re gonna scare my pants off like that one day.”

“Sorry,” the boy says, but he doesn’t sound sorry at all. “Was just admiring the view.”

“It’s great, isn’t it?” Prompto motions towards the hill. His house is perched at the top and it oversees Lestallum on one side, the people moving like tiny ants in the streets, and the mines to the other side, smoke rising into the blue sky. “It feels like you’re on top of the world here.”

“Er, yeah, that.” The boy sounds taken aback. “It’s real nice.”

“You wanna try feeding the birds, too?” Prompto asks. He holds his hands out, still full of feed. “They don’t bite, promise. All you gotta do is just hold your hands out and they’ll come to you. Or you can throw it off the ground if you don’t want them eating off your hands.”

The boy holds out his hands, mirroring Prompto. “Like this?” he says and Prompto nods, pouring the feed into his hands. He crouches down, hesitantly offering the feed to the birds. They’re not afraid of the stranger at all, immediately flocking towards the boy and pecking at his hand. He laughs and holy shit it’s the nicest sound Prompto’s ever heard. It’s only a quiet chuckle but wow, Prompto wants to hear more of it. “You were right. They  _ are  _ kinda cute.”

_ You’re kinda cute,  _ is what Prompto wants to reply with, but he’s not eight and that’s not how he should be flirting at this age. So he says, “Did you have any of these where you came from? Um, where  _ did  _ you even come from? Since, y’know, we already established that you’re not from heaven.”

“No, I came from hell,” the boy deadpans. “Okay, this is gonna sound unbelievable but… you just have to trust me on this one. And… and don’t tell anybody.”

“Did you run away from home or something?”

The boy laughs awkwardly. “Something like that. Have you heard of Insomnia?”

“Yeah, I know a couple miners with it.”

“No, I meant the  _ city _ . Insomnia, the floating city in the sky.”

_ “What?”  _ Prompto gasps. He’s heard of it, of course—who hasn’t? It’s a myth, of a city hiding in the clouds, hidden away from the rest of humanity. It’s filled with people who can control the elements with a flick of their wrist, magical beings that can speak with the astrals themselves. Verstael had been trying to prove its existence with some of his experiments before he passed but  _ this…  _ “You mean it’s  _ real?” _

“You’ve heard of its rumours.” The boy holds up his ring. “You’ve seen my magic.”

“No  _ way.  _ Then… then why are you down here? Have you come with a message from the gods? Is it judgement day?”

That earns Prompto a sigh, which is fair. The boy’s expression turns troubled, though, and he sits down on the grass, pulling a clump or two out. “It’s actually been a while since I’ve lived in Insomnia. My dad… he didn’t just… die randomly. Insomnia was attacked and he died, but he did everything he could to make sure I could flee. I’ve been living on Eos for a while with some people who dad thought he could trust, but something about them feels… wrong.”

“So you ran from them? That’s how you fell from the sky?”

“Yeah.” The boy stares at the horizon and sighs, like the weight of his words are too heavy to even speak. “There’s this guy named Ardyn and he’s curious about the power of this ring.  _ Too  _ curious. I don’t trust him. I was in an airship with him, but I didn’t know where it was going, so I tried taking over it and landing it so I could run but Ardyn’s crafty and stopped me. I ended up falling out and…” The boy lifts his head to face Prompto. “I guess that’s where you caught me.”

Prompto gulps. He  _ really  _ hopes he’s not blushing. 

“I’m glad I did,” he stammers. “I’m sorry that you had to go through all that. But you’re not alone, y’know? If there’s anything I can do to help, just say the word.”

The boy sighs. “I don’t even know what I need help with. During the attack, my memories got scrambled. All I remember is that I need to get back to Insomnia and there’s a duty I need to fulfill with this ring.”

“A duty?”

“No idea what it is. I’m hoping that I’ll remember it once I get back to Insomnia.”

“And if you don’t?”

“Then I make a new plan from there.”

“Speaking of plans, how are you even planning on getting to Insomnia?” Prompto asks. Insomnia’s a myth for a reason. Nobody’s ever  _ really  _ sure if they’ve spotted it or not, and Verstael only had a blurry, faded photo of Insomnia hidden in the clouds and that’s all the proof they’ve got that it even existed. Nobody knows how to get inside it, let alone where it is.

“Dunno.” The boy shrugs nonchalantly. “I was planning on going into town and get an airship? I’m still working out the details.”

“ _ Dude,”  _ Prompto says, “do you know  _ anything  _ about airships? They’re not cheap and no offense, but I don’t think hitching a ride on one is going to be as easy as you thought. I’m not trying to discourage you, but have you even thought this out at all?”

“Nope.” The boy stands up, and brushes off his pants. He looks surprisingly confident for a guy who has  _ no  _ idea what he’s going to do in life.

Prompto gets up. “Let me go with you.”

“ _ Huh?” _

“I’ve heard of a woman named Lady Lunafreya in a place called Altissia,” Prompto begins, tapping his chin. “She kinda speaks with the astrals? Ish? I don’t know all the details on it, but I know that she’s got a bit of magic on her own. If there’s anybody who probably knows something about your magic and Insomnia, it’ll be her.”

“No, no, no, I wasn’t asking about that. I mean, thanks for telling me, but what— _ why  _ do you want to come with me?” The boy waves his hands about and looks like he’s three seconds away from grabbing Prompto by the shoulders and shaking him ‘til his brain starts working again.

“Dunno,” Prompto parrots. “I just wanna help you.”

“But you’ve just met me.”

“So? You need my help and I can’t just turn that down. Besides, I know this place and I know a couple people that can help us out. I told you before,” Prompto lightly slaps the boy’s arm, “you’re not alone. You don’t have to be alone.”

The boy stares down at his arm like he’s been stung, then looks at Prompto as if he’s got three eyes. “You really mean that?” he asks in a quiet voice. Prompto nods and the boy exhales. “You’re… kinda dumb, aren’t you?”

“I’ve had a couple people tell me that, yeah.” Prompto’s known that he’s never been the sharpest knife in the drawer and okay fine, so maybe he’s a little lonely and going on an adventure with a cute guy is something he’s always dreamed about.

“You don’t even know me.”

Prompto sticks his hand out. “Name’s Prompto Argentum. What about you?”

The boy hesitates, then grabs his hand. “It’s… Noct. Just Noct,” he eventually says.

“There. Now we know each other.”

That earns Prompto a laugh and goddamn, if he wasn’t smitten before, this would have done the trick. The guy’s laugh is breathy and heavenly and Prompto would die just to hear it again.

“But are you  _ really  _ sure? Altissia’s far, isn’t it? You’ll be leaving everything behind and we don’t even know if we’ll get the answers we need in there.”

“I’ve got my own reasons for going to Altissia.” Like wanting to go on a trip with a gorgeous guy and hopefully prove to him that he’s worth his time. “Maybe I’m planning to turn you into the authorities there.”

Prompto winks for good measure and hey, maybe he  _ can  _ do this flirting thing right.

“Oh,  _ please.” _

“But I’m really serious.” Prompto’s voice softens. “I  _ do _ wanna help you. I’ve got some friends in Lestallum that can point us in the right direction. We can trust them.”

“...Alright,” Noct finally says. “Alright. To Altissia?”

Prompto cheers. “To Altissia!”

**Author's Note:**

> At the moment, I don't have any plans for expanding this AU, but I do have some notes + a little more worldbuilding in the endnotes of [Morning in Lestallum](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20059291). That one is a Gladnis-style sequel if you want to read more :>!!
> 
> (by the way, if there is any lore/inconsistencies between the two, i'll apologize bc it's been a while since i wrote morning in lestallum askgh)
> 
> ((and I'm always up for chatting about this AU over on my [Twitter/Tumblr](https://twitter.com/Aratanaruu))) ♡♡


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